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Christmas Night of 1862 · Ririro.com - Poetry

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  Speaker 1: Christmas night of eighteen sixty two. The wintry blast goes
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  Speaker 1: wailing by. The snow is falling overhead. I hear the
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  Speaker 1: lonely sentries, tread and distant watch fires light the sky.
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  Speaker 1: Dim forms go flitting through the gloom. The soldiers cluster
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  Speaker 1: round the blaze to talk of other Christmas days, and
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  Speaker 1: softly speak of home and home. My saber, swinging overhead,
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  Speaker 1: gleams in the watch fire's fitful glow, while fiercely drives
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  Speaker 1: the blinding snow, and memory leads me to the dead.
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  Speaker 1: My thoughts go wandering to and fro, vibrating TwixT the now.
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  Speaker 1: And then I see the low browed home again, the
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  Speaker 1: old hall, wreathed in mistletoe, and sweetly from the far
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  Speaker 1: off years comes born the laughter, faint and low, the
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  Speaker 1: voices of the long ago. My eyes are wet with
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  Speaker 1: tender tears. I feel again the mother kiss. I see
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  Speaker 1: again the glad surprise that lighted up the tranquil eyes
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  Speaker 1: and brimmed them oar with tears of bliss. As rushing
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  Speaker 1: from the old hall door, she fondly clasped her wayward boy,
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  Speaker 1: her face all radiant with the joy she felt to
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  Speaker 1: see him home once more. My saber, swinging on the bough,
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  Speaker 1: gleams in the watch fire's fitful glow, while fiercely drives
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  Speaker 1: the blinding snow a slant upon my saddened brow. Those
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  Speaker 1: cherished faces are all gone asleep within the quiet graves
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  Speaker 1: where lies the snow in drifting waves, And I am
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  Speaker 1: sitting here alone. There's not a comrade here tonight, but
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  Speaker 1: knows that loved ones far away, on bended knees this
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  Speaker 1: night night will pray God bring our darling from the fight.
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  Speaker 1: But there are none to wish me back. For me,
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  Speaker 1: no yearning prayers arise. The lips are mute and close
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  Speaker 1: the eyes. My home is in the bivouac.